forensic medicine

11.22.09

Italian Court Reduces Murderer's Sentence Due To Presence of Gene Linked To Violence

By Stuart Fox Posted 11.03.2009 at 2:45 pm 3 Comments

As Doctor Hibert so eloquently put, "only one in two million people has what we call the "evil gene". Hitler had it, Walt Disney had it, and Freddy Quimby has it." And while we understand that line as a joke, it seems that an Italian court has taken the idea far more seriously.

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READ MORE ABOUT > cognitive neuroscience, courts, crime, criminals, forensic medicine, genes, genetics, italy, law, murderers, murders, nature vs nurture, neurology, sentences

Training Machines to Detect the Smell Of Death

By Susannah F. Locke Posted 08.19.2009 at 7:29 am 2 Comments

Researchers are now profiling the chemicals released from decaying bodies, in an effort to create a sensor that might be able to sniff out corpses in the rubble, or determine a dearly departed's precise time of death.

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READ MORE ABOUT > crime, death, forensic medicine, forensic scientist, forensics, scent, scent detection, smell, sniffers

Learning From the Dead

Turns out that a body reveals more details about its death than once thought

By Melinda Dodd Posted 09.17.2008 at 12:29 pm 2 Comments

Whether it’s the blue, ragged fingernails of a heroin-overdose victim or the scaly skin of someone poisoned by arsenic, a corpse bears signs that unveil the secrets behind its life and death. Right now, 40,000 John and Jane Does wait in morgues. Although accident and murder victims are 15 to 30 times as likely to be autopsied as those who die of natural causes, even run-of-the-mill autopsies can yield important information on how a person died. This data has important implications for public health and safety and the legislation that governs those areas of interest.

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READ MORE ABOUT > autopsies, death, forensic medicine, Instant Expert, Instant Expert 2008, October 2008